“I don’t say he’s a great man. Willy Loman never made a lot of money. His name was never in the paper. He’s not the finest character that ever lived. But he’s a human being, and a terrible thing is happening to him. So attention must be paid. He’s not to be allowed to fall into his grave like an old dog. Attention, attention must be finally paid to such a person.” An excerpt from Act 1 of “Death Of A Salesman” by Arthur Miller, published in 1949.
I thought a reference to that classic work appropriate since my radio show tonight deals with an item that was routinely sold door-to-door. The program has, at its heart, a superstition about brooms and sweeping in the month of May. I found this some years back in a very old book.
“It is of course within the house itself that most of our older superstitions have become firmly established in their original and undisguised form … An old lady known to the author regards Friday housework as so disaster-provoking that she finds it necessary to chant as she sweeps the charming homemade litany, ‘Friday, Friday, keep your nose tidy,’ which is in her eyes a protective charm of great psychic efficacy.”
The author goes on to say that some people … ” …when cleaning a room find themselves unconsciously sweeping inwards rather than towards the door and will perhaps wonder why they adopted this habit in the first place. This custom has developed as the direct outgrowth of an old and apparently universal superstition which for some unknown reason equates dust with luck or money, and has found expression in the strongly held conviction that by sweeping outwards one ’sweeps the luck of the house away.’ It is a superstition that has become completely extinct in households where a vacuum cleaner is used.” An excerpt from “Superstition And The Superstitious‘ by Eric Maple, published in 1971 by A. S. Barnes, New Jersey. Apparently it is bad luck to buy a brush or broom in the month of May, as well.
“‘You’d better take this with you,’ the stranger said, coming after him and holding his satchel out. ‘It’ll open doors that might otherwise be slammed in your face.’ He opened the satchel, hauled a plain hand brush out and gave the satchel to George. ‘When the lady of the house comes to the door, you give her this and say: ‘Good evening, madam. I’m from the World Cleaning Company, and I want to present you with this handsome brush absolutely free.’ It’s a cinch, you try it.’ He forced the brush into George’s hand. George dropped the brush into the satchel and closed it with an angry snap. ‘Here,’ he said, …and then stopped, … for there was no one in sight.”
At Christmas time we all gather around the tv set to watch “It’s A Wonderful Life” that starred Jimmy Stewart as “George Bailey.” It’s interesting to note that the original story, written by Philip Van Doren Stern in 1943, was called The Greatest Gift: An X-mas Tale. It was also included in the book No, but I Saw the Movie: The Best Short Stories Ever Made into Film, by David Wheeler, published in 1989 by Penguin Books. In the original story, ‘George Bailey’ is ‘George Pratt’ and when the angel, ‘Clarence,‘ gives him his wish and shows him a town without his major influence, one of the things he gives George is a brush to help him get his foot in the door.
“He wanted desperately now to see Mary. He stumbled blindly up the path to his own house and knocked on the door. After a long silence, Mary came to the door. George’s voice almost failed him. ‘Merry Christmas ma’am,’ He managed at last. His hand shook as he tried to open the satchel. ‘Come in,’ Mary said indifferently. George got his satchel open. One of the brushes had a bright blue handle and varicolored bristles. He handed it to Mary.. ‘This would be fine for your sofa,’ He said. ‘My, that’s a pretty brush!’ She exclaimed. ‘You’re giving it away?’ He nodded. She stroked the sofa gently with the brush, smoothing out the velvety nap. ‘It is a nice brush. Thank you.”
Her husband comes in and grumbles something about brush salesmen. It was this sequence that really made George aware about how much he desperately wanted to find that angel and get his life back on track again.
At the very end of the story, Philip Van Doren Stern writes, “He pulled her down on the sofa and was about to tell her about his dream when his fingers touched something on the seat of the sofa. He did not even have to pick the thing up, for he knew what it was. And he knew that it would have a blue handle and varicolored bristles.”
“Willy was a salesman. And for a salesman, there is no rock bottom to the life. He don’t put a bolt to a nut, he don’t tell you the law or give you medicine. He’s a man way out there in the blue, riding on a smile and a shoeshine. And then they start not smiling back-that’s an earthquake. And then you get yourself a couple of spots on your hat, and you’re finished. Nobody dast blame this man. A salesman is got to dream, boy. It comes with the territory..” The requiem to “Death of a Salesman” by Arthur Miller.
One of the great modern-day classic films about the life of a salesman would have to be the 1992 film “Glengarry Glen Ross”. I really enjoyed the film about seven real-estate salesmen who are on the brink of being fired from their jobs if they don’t make the big sale. The product was not brushes or brooms, but suspect real-estate. The atmosphere was that of a boiler room. The film starred Al Pacino, Jack Lemmon, Ed Harris, Alec Baldwin, Alan Arkin, Kevin Spacy, Jonathan Pryce, and others. It truly was a remarkable cast, and detailed the high-pressure world of sales and the emotional toll it took on those who had to meet a quota of sales before a deadline. Pacino was the leader in sales. If there was a Willy Loman- type character, then it would had to have been the one portrayed by Jack Lemmon who had fallen on hard times with very few prospects to meet the deadline. I’m sure a lot of listeners have received a call like the ones made in this film. Alec Baldwin was great as the hard-nosed hatchet-man ready to bring a career to a close. If we as viewers were affected by this very tough film, I’m sure that salespeople who saw it were even more affected. Sales has always been a tough way to earn a living, but you wouldn’t want to end up your career working for a firm like the one depicted in the film.
Over the years, some traveling salesman have had to contend with jokes at their expense. Encyclopedia salesman and brush salesmen, salespeople going from door-to-door selling cosmetics were the ones we remember from a long time since passed. In this day and age, it’s a much different world for the travelling salesperson. Today, cellphone technology, the Internet, and websites have eased the pressure somewhat. But occasionally you’ll still answer the door to find a salesperson there on a cold-call, ready to ply their trade. It’s a tough business that requires a very special type of person. Today, the door-to-door salesman has found a new way to get inside spam in your mail.
I ran across an interesting excerpt from one of the all-time great salesmen. It was featured in the Tuesday February 22nd, 2005 issue of The Globe and Mail’s Social Studies column. “The Fuller Brush Company, started by Alfred C. Fuller in 1906, became the epitome of door-to-door suavity. In his autobiography, A Foot in the Door (1960)-actually, Fuller sales reps were trained to take a step backward from the door to show the house occupant they were harmless-Mr. Fuller tells of a woman who let him into the house reluctantly, saying, ‘Lead me not into temptation.’ He replied: ‘Madam, I am not leading you into temptation but delivering you from evil..’ He sold three brushes.”
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Don Jackson
